Kugel Capers

Today was one of the most surreal days of my life. While Matt was in Moscow, I had nothing much to do, so I asked my friend Autumn if she wanted to hang out. She had committed to help cook for a «bris party» at a local bar, City Bar, which is owned by a woman from New York named Eileen, whom I vaguely remembered reading about in our Lonely Planet guide to St. Petersburg. I quickly agreed to pitch in and help cook. The bris, which is happening tomorrow at Shaarei Shalom is for the newborn son of a fascinating American guy I met there on two previous occasions. Just as I love to cook for the families of newborns back at home – after all, that's what we Jews do, right? – I figured that there is no better way to welcome a new Jewish baby into the community than to make a huge kugel!

So without a second thought, I grabbed my favorite kugel recipe (thanks to Sandy Lubaroff who makes the best kugel in the whole world), I crossed town to find the City Bar, and introduced myself to Eileen. That was a 3:15 this afternoon. We planned the menu (traditional Jewish with a New Orleans twist – bagels, kugel, and jambalaya) and got organized over a cup of coffee. For the next three hours, Autumn, Eileen and I had traversed the city in our search for ingredients. Would «tvorogom» work as a suitable substitute for cottage cheese? What kind of noodles did I need? Could we find pre-sliced lox to serve on the custom-ordered bagels? Finally, by 7:00 we were back at the restaurant and I went to work on the kugel while Autumn and Eileen went out to one more store to find a few last-minute items. Hanging out in the kitchen with the Nigerian cook, I flashed back to my Jewish Service Corps application; one of the essays asked what skills I could bring to the community and among the skills I listed, I ranked cooking as the most important. Funny that, months later, I find myself standing in the kitchen of a restaurant half-way around the world, making a kugel for a bris. I never could have imagined this scenario, but I felt that it fit neatly within my goals as a volunteer here. After all, what better way to reach the Jewish community than through its stomach?

By the time Autumn and Eileen got back, I had a huge kugel waiting to go into the oven. Autumn and I got busy working on the chocolate chip cookies. Well, actually, they are chocolate chunk cookies, since chips are impossible to find here. By 10:30, we pulled out the last batch of cookies as we chowed down on freshly-made pizza and enjoyed a nice bottle of Chilean merlot. We chatted with Eileen's customers – one more interesting than the next – as I wondered to myself what next week's adventure would be.